“Okay. Both or either of you stay as long as you can, but I think you should take turns and one of you should go home and try and get some sleep. We’re no good to Evie if we’re dead on our feet.”
“I can’t sleep. Sorry. I’m too wired,” Blaire said.
“Same.” Raquelle sighed.
“I’ll probably crash out later, but now—”
“Yeah, no, that’s fair. I feel like I’m crawling out of my skin,” Nicole admitted. The door dinged on five. An elderly black man stepped on and pressed the button for the ground floor. Nicole would have to wait to lay out the rest of her game plan. When the doors opened on three, she ushered Raquelle and Blaire out into the hallway and found a quiet corner next to a vending machine.
“Okay. Protocol stands. If anyone has any questions you direct them to me.” Nicole hated to sound so calculated, but the narrative was everything. The police had spoken to as many of the party guests as they could and still no one had a clue how Evie had wound up so badly injured in the stairwell. With no real facts, folks were left to gossip.
If people thought Evie couldn’t handle her booze or keep her balance at a simple holiday party, that could cause problems for her extremely clean image that, in her case, reflected the real thing. Evie had worked way too hard for her career and her brand. The last thing Nicole wanted was a set of loose lips screwing things up with Evie and the producers onThe Dish. “Has Evie’s phone quieted down a bit?” she asked Raquelle.
“Yes, and I did like you said. Ignored all the general texts expressing concern and responded as myself to personal friends. She slipped when one of her heels broke and bumped her head.”
“Excellent. For now. Evie is doing much better. She’s just going to lay low for the holidays and get some rest. Got it?”
Nicole watched Raquelle’s throat work as she processed her instructions. When she nodded, Nicole went on. “I’ll let the network and production know she’s up and about and will be ready to go when we’re back from the break. I have to run back to the office. I have a meeting at four, but 9-1-1 text me if anything else comes up. I’ll swing back by tonight. You going to be okay?” she asked Blaire. Tears were lining her eyes again.
“Yeah, I’ll be fine. I’m just worried about her. She had no idea who we were.”
“I know. Let’s just think best-case scenarios for now. Her memory could come back in the next few hours. We panic when we need to panic. Try to at least take a nap. You’re a good fucking friend, Blaire, but you can’t be there for Evie if you can’t stand up.”
“Okay. I’ll get some sleep. I promise.”
“Oh! What was that business about the ranch? The cousins or something.”
“Right! Raquelle. Evie told me you have all her in-case-of-an-emergency info saved, right? There was some guy she grew up with on that ranch. He knew her grandmother?”
“Oh yeah. Um . . . the last name was Pleasant. I have it my docs. Hold on.” They waited as Raquelle’s finger flew across her phone screen. “Jesse Pleasant. He uh . . . hold on one sec. Big Rock Ranch, Charming, California.”
“That’s it!” Blaire said with a loud snap of her fingers. “I knew she was from some town that sounded extra cutesy.”
“But she told me literally only to call him if she dies,” Raquelle said.
“Okay. Well, she’s not dead,” Nicole replied. “But let’s keep that number in the top of the contacts.”
“Why? What are you thinking?” Blaire asked.
“I’m thinking about what we’re going to do if her memory doesn’t come back.”
* * *
Evie snapped out of a deep sleep, her whole body jerking. Her eyes blinked open as her heart thudded in her chest. It was so much so fast, she closed her eyes again. Her head still hurt a little. She’d been dreaming and she wasn’t ready to wake up. She knew she was in the hospital. She’d spent almost a whole day being subjected to tests. There had been an accident and she’d hit her head and now she couldn’t remember a thing. But she wasn’t alone. When she’d woken up the first time, the woman named Blaire, who was apparently her best friend and roommate, had been by her bedside and she’d stayed there most of the day. Blaire answered her questions and helped make a little more sense of what she was missing.
She was a chef who starred on a morning television show. There had been a holiday party and she’d fallen down some stairs. Blaire had showed her pictures they’d taken while they were getting dressed for the party. She now recognized Blaire with her luminous brown skin, beautiful hair, and bright smile, but the woman next to her in the photo was a complete stranger. When Evie asked to see a mirror and was presented with Blaire’s cell phone camera so she could look at her face, she still felt like she was looking at a stranger, but this time the stranger wore glasses and had bandage on the side of her head. Not knowing her own face—hell, being unsure of her own name—filled Evie with a kind of unease that she couldn’t put into words. But something told her at the very least she could trust Blaire.
When she wasn’t having her body’s metrics taken or subjected to various scans, or listening to Blaire, she slept. Three times throughout the day and all through the night, she slept hard. Every time she’d had a weird dream. Bits and pieces of each dream still lingered. She remembered this most recent dream so clearly, she felt like she was still working her way through it.
It made no sense to her, but somehow there were two suns. One blazing overhead. She’d forgotten her bandana and her cowboy hat, and the sun was beating down on the back of her neck, beating down on the crown of her head. The other sun was setting in the distance, painting the sky purple and pink. She made her way toward the horizon on the back of a large brown horse, but she was riding backward. She could still see the horse’s tail flicking rhythmically as they made their way down the trail.
And then there was this man walking beside the horse. A gorgeous Black man wearing a black cowboy hat and a Lakers jersey. Kobe 8. When she saw him, she realized the heat she was feeling wasn’t from the sun. It was the heat radiating from the smile on his face. She could feel that heat coming up from her stomach and spreading all over her cheeks and down the back of her neck. She could still hear his voice. He laughed at her, teased her. They were going to be late. She wanted to tell him to stop making fun of the way she was riding, but her tongue wouldn’t work. It didn’t seem to really matter, though. Deep down she didn’t want the teasing to stop.
Evie tried to open her eyes again and this time her body was better prepared. Carefully she tried to sit up, pushing herself up against the thin pillows.
“Hey. You’re up?” Evie looked over at the chair beside her bed. Everything was blurry, but she had heard the owner of that voice enough in the last twenty-four hours. It was Blaire. “Here. Here are your glasses.” Evie took the pink frames Blaire placed in her hand and slid them on her face. Much better. Her room was dim, but she could see. Blaire was wrapped in a blue hospital blanket, her legs stretched out in front of her.
“Hey. How are you feeling?” she asked.